Nicaragua March

I had expressed interest in going in July, as part of a medical team, but I was also very interested in working with the women’s and children’s shelter that I wrote about previously. Several others were too, so my church added women’s shelter teams to teams already going in March and November, and I’m on the one for March.

So what are we going to be doing? Not sure yet. We’ll be staying at the missions compound which sounds a lot like the GA or Acteen’s camp that I went to as a young teen. We’ll have beds and indoor plumbing and someone to cook for us, unlike those who go into the village and have tents, outdoor bathrooms and beans and rice three times a day.

We’ll go to the shelter every day and may lead a Bible study or do a children’s Bible lesson, may do some sewing or other needle crafts … we don’t know; the details are still being worked out. But whatever we “do” it will all be with the purpose of showing love; to love on women and children who may not have felt loved in a while or ever and hopefully to show them the source of the love as God himself.

Funny story: in December, at the end of a class on learning your spiritual gifts, my pastor had us fill out a survey of sorts where we listed our gifts, our personality tendencies and our passions, all with the purpose of helping us find a place to serve. My passions? I listed reading, writing, knitting, sewing, and working with the pregnancy test center. While I knew that God could and has used some or all of those passions, I thought my pastor is gonna look at this and laugh. Because he doesn’t need people who are passionate about sewing or reading; he needs people to teach Sunday School or serve meals or do building maintenance stuff.

I had the wrong mentality. That survey wasn’t about the pastor or what the pastor needed but about the one I really serve, which is God, and what he needs. I just find it ironic in that crazy way that God works, that the very passions I named, and that I felt so inadequate and useless for having, are the very things that we’ll be doing as part of this trip. It’s like God was saying “Joke’s on you, Heather.”

From the day that I committed to go, Finn, of his own volition, has been praying over this trip, and I’m so moved by his belief in prayer and the power of prayer to do something, that prayer matters, at such a young age and maturity. He’s asked me if we can take the kids there stuffed animals because a teacher at his school went on a mission trip and took stuffed animals to give to the children where she went. I don’t know if we can or will — I had the thought that maybe one of the things we do is sew stuffed animals once we get there — but I love that he is thinking about the people and the children there and wanting to show love too.

So, the ball is rolling. The passport has been applied for, the airline tickets purchased, the malaria medicine acquired.